The Moon is Made of Cheese
by bluemeanies
Summary: A fiction about the Apollo 11 moon landing, and how James, Sirius, Peter, Remus, Snape and Lily saw it r/r


The Moon is Made of Cheese  
  
A/n: Corny title huh, I can guarantee you, the fic is a little corny too, but good. A little break from my other HP works (which you should read, everyone who has read them has had very good things to say. they are called "Why does it rain on Knockturn Alley?", "Hallows Eve" and "Terry Boot and Professor Binns' Extra Credit") but you don't have to too understand this work, even though Cassius is borrowed from Knockturn Alley, and is a Ravenclaw. Set July 20, 1969, centered around 2 in the morning GMT on the 21st actually.  
  
Disclaimer: JKR owns the characters; the main event is a part of world heritage.  
  
Author's rant: I have seen too many MWPP era fictions where somehow or another the Backstreet Boys, a television show or something that is definitely not around in the 60's (pre-Hogwarts) or the 70's (Hogwarts) is mentioned. I will admit I wasn't around then either, but I like my fiction chronologically correct, so here is a fiction about one of the major events of the 60's  
  
  
  
And now, our feature presentation:  
  
***  
  
Very rarely do muggles beat wizards in being the first to do anything, but when they do it captures the mind of both worlds and draws them closer together. Such is the case of the Apollo 11 moon landing. For a few glorious minutes the human race was not muggle or wizard but stood together united, looking to the stars and to the future, mankind's destiny in space. This is the story of five young wizards and one young witch, on this most glorious of nights.  
  
***  
  
"Severus, come on. Dad gave me permission to go to go to Arthur's party only if I brought you along. We have to hurry or we'll miss the big event." Cassius yelled at his little brother, hurrying to make the big party that Arthur Weasley was throwing in honor of the moon landing for all the upperclassmen at Hogwarts.  
  
"Why does anyone want to go to the moon anyway? Everyone knows the moon is made of cheese. I don't see how everyone can get so excited over cheese." Severus, his seven year old little brother said.  
  
"Come on if it is made of cheese, it will be very funny to see them land on it." Cassius replied as they reached the port key that had been set up in Diagon Alley to go to the party. Suddenly Severus was in the middle of the large crowd, and a tall lanky redheaded boy approached and shook Cassius's hand.  
  
"Glad you could make it Cassius, and who is this?" the boy said.  
  
" My little brother, Severus, dad made me bring him." Cassius said.  
  
"Hello Severus, would you like some cheese?" Arthur said presenting him with a plate of various cheeses with colored toothpicks sticking out of them.  
  
"No thank you." Severus said, and started walking around the party. Most people's attention was focused on a small box emitting a light forming a picture, that didn't seem to be moving. It was a landscape all pocked and gray, the likes of which he had never seen before with a large ugly pod sitting on the ground. Everyone was either sitting or waiting intently, or in the back of the room catching up with their friends. The only people who didn't occasionally leave the couches in front of the television were him and the redhead, who he assumed was Arthur. Arthur, because he was mesmerized, Severus because he knew no one there except his brother. Nothing continued to happen, until a little after three when the pod opened and out stepped a man in a funny fluffy suit. He started to step out of the module, but instead of a normal gait. Despite his normal skeptical thinking, Severus thought for a moment that this looks like fun, and maybe he would go to the moon someday.  
  
Just then a voice came out of the box, "One small step for man, one giant leap…"  
  
***  
  
James Potter was excited. It wasn't every night that his parents let him stay up late, and it wasn't every night that man landed on the moon. As he was staring at the strange muggle device known as a 'television' and the strange lunar landscape, James started thinking. What would it be like to live on the moon? Were little green men living there, like the muggle's always said? Would he ever get to meet alien life, while living on the moon? What was Quidditch like on the moon? What would a Quidditch match against Sirius be like on the moon? He was lost in the image of a Quidditch team being blown around by strange lunar winds when, on the television, a man in a bulky white suit came out, and he was flying. On the moon muggles could fly!!!! Not very well, mind you, because he had to land again after a few feet and to anyone else it might have looked like jumping, but too James, he was flying! It was becoming even more incredible every minute!!!  
  
"One small step for man, one giant leap…"  
  
***  
  
"Peter, go to bed. I'm sure they will show it again in the morning." Mrs. Pettigrew said to her son and started to drag him to his bedroom.  
  
"But I want to see it." He screamed trying to wriggle his way away from his mother, but despite his screaming, he was eventually dragged to his bed, and his mother tucked him in. Peter sat in his bed and sulked for a while, then, when he was certain his mother was quietly back in the living room, Peter snuck on tiptoe to the entrance and hid behind the wall, watching the image on the screen. So that was the moon. To Peter's eyes, it was the most glorious place he had ever seen. It was a place where no one would tell him what to do, ever. It was a place where he could always be the best, unlike school. He reached out his hand as if to touch it. Just then a man stepped out of the module, and started walking on the moon. Peter was delighted. On the moon, even the restrictions of gravity were lessened.  
  
"One small step for man, one giant leap…"  
  
***  
  
Usually spending time with his dad discussing muggle things was boring to Sirius. Ever since his mom had died in that 'incident' his links to the wizarding world had been for the most part severed as he lived with his muggle dad. The only regular contact he had with wizards was his good friend James, and he tried to spend as much time with James as possible to remind himself he wasn't a muggle. When his father tried to teach him how to ride a bicycle, he insisted that he would never ride a bicycle but a broomstick. But tonight he was actually glad to be half-muggle, because muggles were doing something that wizards had never done. Walking on the moon. It was no longer just an orb that loomed uncomfortably over his shoulder when he was about to do mischief, but a place that people could visit. A place that Sirius could visit. A place where he could write his name in huge letters and everyone could see it in the sky. Someday, he swore to himself he would go there. Suddenly, on the television, a man stepped out of the pod, and was bouncing along the surface. A voice came out of the box.  
  
"One small step for man, one giant leap..."  
  
***  
  
"Why does Petunia get to stay up and I don't?" Lily Evans asked her father.  
  
"Because Petunia is older." Alan Evans replied to his younger daughter. From the living room, Petunia stuck her tongue out at Lily. Her mother got up and walked to her father.  
  
"Alan, Lily's ten now, I'm sure she can handle it. It is a once in a lifetime experience, and it would be a shame for her to miss it." Rose said to her husband, Lily was giving her big puppy dog eye look to him.  
  
"Oh, alright, but don't complain when I wake you up tomorrow morning." Alan said.  
  
"Yeah!! I get to stay up!! Unh." She said to Petunia and sticking her tongue out at her.  
  
Lily sat down on the couch, staring at the barren surface of the moon, she started thinking about how much wider humans could reach than her little neighborhood in Surrey. If people could reach the moon, maybe, just maybe there was a place out there where she belonged. She would reach beyond the world if she had to. She was aching to get away and push the limits of human possibility. In the barren soil of the moon, a new realization grew for Lily, that she could do anything that she put her mind to. The pod opened up and out came the astronaut, though she wasn't sure if it was Neil Armstrong or Buzz Aldrin the two men her father had told her would land on the moon. He started springing across the surface and she heard a crackly transmission,  
  
"One small step for man, one giant leap…"  
  
***  
  
So that was the moon, his eternal tormenter. On his television, she looked completely innocent, that barren landscape. But he knew just how cruel the moon could be. She was extremely fickle in her moods and had the capacity to turn men into monsters. He knew this, and he knew that she would next come looking for him in only a week. Yet no matter how much pain she might cause him, Remus couldn't take his eyes off of her. The moon just wouldn't let go of him.  
  
But, then this landing didn't bring only pain but hope. It meant that man could conquer the moon, because there he was, sitting on that barren landscape. It was also the first time that he saw hope in getting nearer to the moon rather than farther from it. On the moon, there was only a light side and a dark side, it could only appear new to an observer on earth. If a Remus could stand on the moon, would he ever experience a full moon or those hideous transformations again? Could he be free forever, no different than any other boy, living a normal life on the moon where it didn't matter that he was a werewolf? He wasn't sure it would work, but he was more than willing to try.  
  
He sat there, enchanted and repulsed by this barren landscape and its hope for the future and devastation of the present. A man emerged, and started across the surface and said those famous lines, "One small step for man, one giant leap for mankind." and to Remus, those were some of the most important words he ever heard in his life. He watched as the Astronauts planted the American flag into the moon, collected rocks, saw how far they could jump and played golf, and it filled him with joy and happiness such as he had rarely had since the bite. He now knew what he wanted to do; he wanted to be an astronaut, if he could ever get there. The trouble was to take the first step.  
  
***  
  
As Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin explored the Sea of tranquility, and were expanding the limits of humanities reach, our six friends had discovered something that is infinitely more priceless. This night, the moon was made, not of cheese, not of dust, not of rock, but of hope. 


End file.
